God forbid we make sure theyre here legally

State Capitols might be a tad different.. but look at most major metro or urban areas and the private sector building far outnumber State and Federal.

Are these buildings you speak of also the ones with the 30k/yr dishwasher jobs in them?!!!!!

 

I'm speaking current market activity, Monty. In Augusta with the Medical School and local govt projects, that represents the lions share of major activity. The local industries are looking but not moving yet.

 

Still a ton of uncertainty out there for sure and it is going to take a few years for that to ebb.

 

I don't know how strict things are there, and admittedly, it's been almost 2 years since I've been on a commercial job, but back home (ky) here's how it normally worked:
Contractors received state/city funded jobs
Hired out subs
Subs were required to provide proof of insurance for everyone on the jobsite
Subs showed proof of ins on 6 or 8 guys that at most, were on site once a week, and then only one or two at a time.
those guys were getting clocked for 40 hours a week on a job they spent maybe 8 on. Plus they were getting per diem on those jobs.
Guy cashes check, hands out cash to the guys that were actually working.

Sh*t, when I type this out it sounds pretty messed up.

 

GA now has a law that employees must be e verified for elligibility to work. Some folks slip through cracks in the system, but if you run checks, you can find yourself short on labor for certain trades. In my personal experience masonry, concrete and drywall have high concentrations of non-native workers.

 

I think that's why it was overlooked for the past 10 years or so. Housing was booming, everyone was happy, no need to upset the apple cart. Now that things have come to a virtual standstill, it's easier to say "we're gonna do something about it."
If it picked back up tomorrow for another 5 year run, this would be a dead issue. I would chat with some of the guys at lunch and ask them what they thought would happen. It was always the same, "When Obama gets elected, when this/that.... we will get temporary visas." I would have tried to explain, but there was no point

 

Question.

My mother was brought here when she was six months old. She didn't choose to come here. This place is all she knows. She barely speaks Spanish. Married to my American father. She runs a medical center. but cant get her green card.... is she a criminal?

 

Answer: it's obvious the system is flawed, but using your extreme and unusual situation doesn't shed much light on the majority of the problems surrounding this issue

 

Monte, when PF Chang's opened in Raleigh, NC a few years ago the starting rate for a dishwasher was 15/hr. The manager had to have an informal meeting with the managers of the other restaurants in the mall and they agreed not to poach the others employees, it wasn't the waitstaff that they were concerned about. I used to work for one of the other restaurants as a manager.
I'm doing the mechanical on a building/warehouse on Fort Bragg, looking at the schedule the mason has twice the time allotted to do the outside compared to a similar sized building were working on off base in Fayetteville.
I do mainly bid work, which mainly consists of government work so my view on this is biased. I wasn't really talking about large office complexes etc., since they're growth seems to be slower down here compared to public buildings. But, you are correct on that so I will take that statement back.

 

This is why this is such a difficult issue because common sense would say abosolutely not, he law says yes.

Why cannot she get legal status?

 

WOW!! Double WOW!!! $15 an hour.

Regarding buildings... sounds like we were doing the apple to oranges thing.

 

Are you adopted or born here in the USA?

Something doesn't seem right about this, she should have been legal by now either by marriage or by giving birth to American children, no?

 

All my brothers and I were born here.


When she tried to apply for citizenship immigration told her she would have to pay a fine and go to Mexico to get her original birth certificate and fill out some papers and shed get a visa. we paid the fine (a few thousand) and when she went to Mexico and got her birth certificate they flat out denied her a visa at the border and refused her entry to the US. that was in Texas, my mom and dad drove to TJ to try their luck. They got caught. We paid for her to have an apartment in Tijuana for 2 months before we found someone who looked like her (blonde hair blue eyed Mexican, go figure) to let us use their visa to walk across.

Now because she was caught trying to enter the border from TJ after they were already denied in juarez she has a ten year hold on her visa application. And that's if she stays in mexico and isn't found here in the US. basically her only shot is an amnesty program.

 

Kafkaesque...

 

A buddy of mine is a manager at a "national" restaurant. He said he asked a newly hired dishwasher/busser for his social security. He had three different ones. They did not hire him after that.

 

Wow, that's some story....one of you should write about it, have you guys tried your hand in luck with your local Senator/Congressperson?

Sounds like an opportunity for them champion themselves a potential hero especially if they're up for election. Good luck and to answer your original question if your mom is a criminal, NO I don't think she is.....but some government figures might think so.

 

I know a couple of guys in the same situation. They're married to an American but they aren't legal for the same reasons. They know that if they go back to Mexico to wait and do it correctly, there is a very high chance that they'll app for the visa upfront, a couple thousand cash, but still get denied for the visa. The problem is that the system is royally screwed on the US side and completely corrupt on the Mexican side. It's lose lose for the guys

 

A government war on illegals will probably be just as effective as all the other wars...i.e., expensive w/ poor results and long term ramifications.

Reduce the overhead of being American (over abundance of rules, regulations and taxes) so that American employee and business prices will fall to a more natural level.

 

you want to get rid of illegals? get americans willing to do those types of jobs, then we wont need to hire illegals for work. Does anyone really think this country can function without illegals today? Most people 40 and younger are bums, teenagers are even worst. shit, its so bad that even illegals are getting americanized and think they deserve or have the right to something. You want to fight illegals, make teenagers get jobs doing manual labor, college kids that actually graduate and start from the bottom in the field they studied not demanding 100k to start. thats the problem with illegals, we need them